Exclusive: Flipkart Delays Joining Date Of Campus Hires By 6 Months

In a surprise move, Flipkart has delayed the joining dates of its batch of incoming graduates by upto 6 months. This means that the campus hires that Flipkart had made last year, who were supposed to join in June this year, will have to wait till December before they can join the company.

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This delay in joining shall be applicable to students that had been selected by Flipkart from its campus drives at IITs, IIMs, BITS and several other colleges. This puts graduates who had landed coveted Flipkart offers in the unenviable position of waiting for 6 months before starting their corporate careers. Graduates are also unhappy with losing out on the salaries that they’d have earned had Flipkart not delayed their dates of joining.

Companies usually delay the joining dates of fresh graduates when they have overestimated their growth numbers. Flipkart has had a tough couple of months with organizational changes and increasing competition from Amazon and Snapdeal. Its valuation has been cut by as many as three organizations, and there are rumours that it might have to raise money in a down round. The delay in the joining dates could be one such move to conserve cash in a difficult funding environment.

“This postponement was necessitated by the fact that Flipkart is undergoing an organization redesign that involves creation of new units in some cases and integration of few units.”, said a Flipkart spokesperson when contacted by OfficeChai. “Instead of June, 2016, the new recruits will now be part of the improved campus program in December, 2016. Flipkart will also be paying an additional joining bonus of Rs. 1.5 lakh to all campus recruits.”

But in spite of the additional joining bonus, this move is unlikely to go down well with top tier colleges. Flipkart is often a Day 0 or a Day 1 recruiter at college campuses, and this delay could make future students circumspect about accepting Flipkart offers. IIT Placement Committees also look unfavourably at such behaviour, and have in the past blacklisted companies they renege or change offers.

The worst affected, though, are the students whose offers have been changed. They will now need to decide to either look for other jobs or wait for 6 months with no salary in order to join India’s largest e-commerce player.